Tuesday, October 25, 2011

In which I wonder what side-track I should be in for Lindy Focus...

So when I signed up for Lindy Focus in June, I selected the "Advanced Aerials" side track. Mid-July, I had a conversation with a friend of mine about taking it with me, and he said he was down. But I never bothered to correct the TBD on my Focus registration.

So I get an email a few days ago from one of the organizers, just giving me a heads up that I still don't have a partner listed, and I should get that straightened out or I should switch to another track before they all close. I dropped my friend an email to say Hey whats up, are we still doing the aerials class? and he informs me that he's not going to Focus at all. He's shifted primarily into blues gear, which is why I haven't seen him recently. whoops.

I call the only Columbus lead who I'm at have-thrown-a-flip-in-a-jam-circle levels of trust with. Nope, not going to Focus either. Same story again when I talk to one of the other members of the performance team, which I have super-recently been invited to be on (yay!!). I email a lead from a different nearby city, who I've at least played around with, even if if it was only once and he's a much better dancer than me. (though, I am a damn good fly. did some cheer stunting in high school, and have some strength but little fear to bring to the table. plus, I love it. I love to fly.) No dice there, either- he's not taking classes. (and no hint as to how he perceived the request.)

I do have one other friend who lives in a city a few hours away who I have talked to about it, and he's down... but he's moving across the country as of January, so who knows if I'd even ever get to do anything I'd learn.

So I now I'm torn between taking it with this partner (who I do love dancing with, but have never done aerials with, not even just dicking around and would not likely get to actually perform anything we learned together, though I might be able to bring it home to the team), or switching to a different track.

Currently not-sold-out-for-follows and under consideration are:

Movement Training
Step outside of your dance style and learn how you can improve your overall movement quality. Drills and exercises will be given to expand your understanding of your own movement beyond swing dancing, but in a way that you can immediately apply to what you already do.

or

Burlesque
Ladies learn the art of tease and performance even while staying within your jazz dancer's body. This introductory series will get you tastefully raising some eyebrows.

or

Swingout Analysis (intermediate lindy hop and above)This side track is for those brave souls who are ready to dive down that rabbit hole and explore not only the deep inner workings of a great swingout, but also analyze the many swingout possibilities that exist and how they relate to one another. Deepen your understanding of the most important pattern in Lindy Hop!

It's not an accident that two out of the three side tracks I'm thinking about are solo movement. My personal movement quality is something that I know I should, and I would definitely like to keep working on. And maybe it would be just that much better for me as a dancer to abandon the idea of the aerials class, as much pure fun as I feel like that would be, and "eat my vegetables," as it were, in a solo movement class. Of the above, I'm leaning towards burlesque?

Oh well. I guess I'll keep thinking about it... but not for too long! Lest all the side tracks fill up...

UPDATE- Aerials it is. We'll see how this goes!

Further update, 12/5/2011- my and my friend that I was gonna do this with actually didn't get a chance to get together and practice anything before the track-switching deadline. So we both switched to different tracks- me to Movement Training, and him to Vintage Transcription. I do wonder if I'll be allowed to watch the burlesque class, though, as it seems very interesting!